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her in the dark, feeling my way along the walls. By the time
I reached the entrance of the building, Makurik was gone.
I came home alone. I was a bit scared. There was no longer
a light in her house. I turned on the television, the movie
had ended. I barely slept. All night, I kept dreaming that
someone was smothering me with a pillow. Now she’s out
there, sitting on the balcony, staring at a spot. She’s gone
back in. She’s opened the windows of a room, her half-
folded arms lean on the window sill, where she stands in
the middle. She breathes. The sun falls on her face, her
eyes, her neck. She is wearing a white nightdress. She raises
her head and, her eyes closed, breathes. She breathes. Her
eyes are closed. Her eyelids are probably translucent, thin,
with small veins. I can barely keep myself from taking a
photograph of her like that, marvelous, so beautiful, her
eyes closed, filled with sunlight. I can barely resist going
over, hugging her, holding her.
A woman with rheumy eyes approaches me at the bus stop,
“Young lady, I’ve lost the money for my medicine and can’t
see well. Can you give me five hundred drams so that I can
buy the medicine – I won’t be able to get home otherwise.”
This is also a kind of beggary – one cries, the other laughs,
all to pluck some money off you. But I feel sorry for her and
say, well, of course you’re not going to return it, but here
you go. And I take out a five hundred from my money and
give it to her. “No, I’ll return it to you tomorrow for sure,
come here at this time, my child, thank you, bless you.” She